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Mission Viejo, CA, Embarks On Feasibility Study

At one time, it’s hilly geography earned it the label “undevelopable” in the 1960s, but now the planned community of Mission Viejo, California, is home to approximately 97,000 people in Orange County. The city with the suburban feel is looking at ways to develop even further.

A Blank Slate

The city has recently commissioned a feasibility study to examine how this suburban community can improve its connectivity to boost economic development and improve municipal efficiencies.

Develop an understanding of community-wide need for fiber-based broadband;

Document fiber-based broadband demand in the City that leverages the City’s existing relationships with local businesses and stakeholder.

Assess the feasibility of using existing right of way, existing and new conduit pole lines and other assets to reduce the cost of FTTP deployments throughout the City;

Determine the benefits that a fiber network would provide in terms of economic development, education, healthcare, municipal government and the quality of life of its constituents, residents and visitors;

Determine how a fiber network could create added-value through economic efficiencies and cost reductions;

Determine the most feasible options to gain consensus on the path forward to achieve the City’s goals.

Like a number of other communities, Mission Viejo has existing fiber within the city that was deployed some time ago for its Intelligent Transportation System (ITS). The community doesn’t own or operate municipal gas or electric utilities. Incumbent Internet access providers are Cox and AT&T.

Business A Priority

Local businesses have been complaining about poor connectivity for years. Back in 2015, one of the community’s two large retail shopping centers found that Cox Communications didn’t see investing in a connection worthwhile. Merchants at The Village shopping center had to depend on DSL and were understandably irked:

“How can you run a business if you don’t have basic services like the Internet?” said Mary Kim, who owns Skimmer’s Panini Grill. “We can’t even run simple (credit card) transactions. We might as well just go back to using cash.”

The complaints inspired the idea for the city to provide Wi-Fi to the shopping center and city leaders integrated the initiative, along with many others, into its 2016 Technology strategic plan.

Feeds

Random Quote

It is duplicitous to suggest that the incumbents represent the “free market” against “government-subsidized” municipal networks. Incumbents are incumbents precisely because they have had the weight and resources of government to back them up for years. Furthermore, they have had backing from those levels of government - the federal and state - which are least pervious to direct participation by local residents. Municipal networks, funded by the public and accountable to the public, represent a balance to the domination of telecommunications infrastructure by huge corporations which have long enjoyed substantial government subsidy. Banning or restricting municipal networks will end this effort to create a level playing field.